


God's Gonna Cut You Down

by busaikko



Category: Stargate Atlantis
Genre: Brain Injury, Dyscalculia, Gen, Songfic, Traumatic Brain Injury
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-04-26
Updated: 2008-04-26
Packaged: 2017-11-04 11:21:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,227
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/393248
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/busaikko/pseuds/busaikko
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Summary:  <i>Tell me a story / Where we all change / And we'd live our lives together / And not estranged / I didn't lose my mind, it was mine to give away</i> (No Regrets - Robbie Williams)</p>
            </blockquote>





	God's Gonna Cut You Down

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: brain damage, no miracles.
> 
> First, there was Amberlynne and the song "Let's Talk about Spaceships". Then, there was this _gorgeous_ picture [Uncounted](http://aesc.livejournal.com/322571.html) by aesc. Final responsibility for taking these bunnies to the illogical extreme is, of course, mine.

The ship was a dream -- its weapons were a _wet_ dream. Although it had been derelict for millennia and was barely functional, Carter was nevertheless forced to call the ship into service when the hiveships came. Rodney stayed in Atlantis, orchestrating rolling power outages and minor miracles to keep the shield up. High above that gossamer protection, John used his genetic control over the ship to force it to exceed its limitations. From below, the bright trails of drones and ships and missiles looked like the thousand arms of Guan Yin, fanning out in a promise of salvation, protection, hope.

Freeing John from the ship after the battle was won was a nightmare. It would have been easy for Dr Biro to move his body onto the waiting gurney; but Rodney and Radek needed three days to disconnect John's mind. The ship had annexed John's brain to operate armaments and engines, display screens and sensors; it had uploaded and downloaded systems with a ruthless disregard for personal boundaries. Rodney wasn't sure to what extent John had given permission for this, but he was still furious as he worked, trying not to listen to the respirator. The ship fell apart around them as it lost the driving force of John's will, and they had to make a literal run for the jumper in the end. Rodney was terrified that they'd missed some essential part of John, that Biro would wake him up and they'd find him still paralysed, still blind. Or perhaps he simply _wouldn't_ regain consciousness.

Rodney was asleep when John did wake up, a full week after the attack had been repulsed, and John was asleep again when Rodney made it down to see him.

"That figures," he said, glaring at John with his hands on his hips for a good minute before demanding to see the results of all the tests Keller had run.

He managed to miss seeing John awake for three days, until John was released to his room. Apparently John had lost his circadian rhythm, somewhere, but Keller had drugs and a schedule that were intended to replace it. Rodney got his hands on John's schedule with a bit of subterfuge, and went to stand in front of John's door at half past eight, when John was due back from his evening visit to the infirmary.

The Marines had very diligently line-taped routes all over Atlantis, to the mess and the 'gate and the gym, and all the routes ended at John's door. There was a huge X taped onto the door itself, in case John couldn't figure that out, either. When a team had line-taped its way past his lab, Rodney had thought about pointing out that John had never been good with directions in the first place, but he knew that this was so much bigger than that. He also recognised the therapeutic value of doing _something_ in the face of utter disaster.

He was at a loss, himself. That was why he was here.

"Hey, there," John said, turning the corner and giving Rodney a smile as he opened the door and waved Rodney in. He looked so entirely normal that Rodney's heart twisted inside his chest.

"So, did you know what you were doing?" Rodney asked, starting a circuit around the room to see what changes John was making. There were flattened cardboard boxes and a roll of duct tape set on one of John's chairs, but he hadn't actually started packing up yet. Rodney didn't know how long it would be before the SGC's medical board reviewed John's case. He didn't have any doubts about what they'd decide. "Did you _let_ that, that _machine_ tear you apart, or did it rape you?"

John was moving about the room himself, heading for the window, but he paused and looked over at Rodney. His tongue flicked out and swiped his upper lip; Rodney didn't think John was aware of the movement.

"I can't answer that," John said, very slowly, and looked around the room as if he'd mislaid something. "I agreed to the interface -- that was the _point_ of me being there -- and after that. . . ."

"The ship slipped you a digital roofie," Rodney insisted.

John grinned. "I _was_ the ship. And if you make any Anne McCaffrey jokes, I'll hurt you."

"With all you lost, I can't believe you hung onto crappy science fiction." Rodney heard the words with a frisson of horror, and reached up as if he could grab them back. It didn't work.

John took a deep breath and turned away from Rodney, wavering a moment before crossing to the latticed window. "I got to keep all the crappy stuff -- what does a spaceship need with stories or first kisses or failed marriages? And language," he added, and Rodney's shoulders tensed the same way that John's did at the thought of losing communication. "I had to think in the ship's language -- English wouldn't have worked."

Rodney picked up the objects set in a row on the desk and put them down again: watch, books, pens, the keys to a Toyota light-years away. "Maybe you can communicate with other tech. Then you'd have -- " He cut himself off before making the unforgivable blunder of saying _a reason to stay here_. John shot a smile over his shoulder that was sharp and knowing and not nice at all, as if he'd finished Rodney's sentence anyway.

"I didn't know what was happening when you disconnected me," John said, tracing the lattice with his fingers. Oddly, there was no dust, and Rodney wondered why. He had cobwebs and crooked little alien spiders in his room. "So I didn't try to stop you. But if I interfaced again -- " Even sidelong Rodney could see John's grimace.

"You're addicted," Rodney said, thinking of Ford, remembering begging for the sure power of the wraith enzyme. He remembered being such a genius that the universe stripped its secrets bare for him. He still missed that, in his dreams.

"I'm _crippled_ ," John shot back. "I feel like my body is wrong, and my mind's _soup_. I'm always reaching for things that aren't there. You have no idea what it was like. Like -- like dancing, or music. Like a symphony. And now there's only this." He made a sharp flick of his fingers from head to toe, and then wound his hands tightly in the lattice, staring out over the ocean. "I could hook up but I don't think I could _unhook_ again."

"We tried," Rodney said, his mouth cotton dry with the need to confess. "I swear to you, I did -- maybe not the best that could have been done, but the best that I was capable of. I don't think the Ancients intended the process to be reversible. I think the pilot was supposed to be kept in stasis, permanently attached to the ship. There wasn't time. I don't know how long it would have taken to find everything the ship stole from you and put it back." He could still hear the respirator, regular, harsh, and the screams of rending metal, the muted explosions of the ship as it died.

"I know," John said, nodding, and Rodney thought he preferred anger to understanding. "I'm glad to be alive. I'm glad to be walking, and talking, and I'm glad to be home." He shrugged, and leant his forehead against the metal. "If any wraith survived, if things get desperately bad, keep me in mind. I'd do it again in a heartbeat, to keep everyone safe, but."

"We wouldn't be able to get you out again." Rodney crossed and uncrossed his arms. "You're an irritating asshole -- at least, you always have been, and I doubt very much that the Ancient tech stole your annoyingness. But I like having you around."

"Pretty sure annoyingness isn't a word," John said.

Rodney dismissed this with a wave. "Geniuses are allowed to make their own words. And," he added, jabbing a finger at John, "you are the dictionary definition of annoyingness. Way to ruin the moment."

"Hadn't noticed we were having a moment." John grinned, and his hands slipped free of the bars. There were red marks across his palms from where he'd been gripping too tightly.

"I came here to say, if there's anything I can do. . . ."

"Like my taxes?" John's expression was mocking. Rodney supposed he deserved it. "Lorne's got my job and a lot of new grey hairs to go with it. We tried -- I can't fly a jumper. The HUD's meaningless, I can't judge distances, and I can't dial the DHD. I can shoot, with a laser sight, but don't ask me how much ammo I have left, or anything to do with calibres." He shrugged, and he must have seen something of Rodney's grief on his face because he took three steps forward to clap his hand on Rodney's shoulder, both as comfort and to steer him back to the desk. "Do you want any of this crap?" He waved grandly, just like television shopping. "The car's a beater and it's green and in Oregon -- got it cheap off this guy. The books -- aren't that much fun, now, plus I forget what page I'm on. The watch might look good on you."

John hefted the watch. It was ridiculous and oversized, probably waterproof and crush-resistant and bullet-proof and shatter-proof, with someone's name written in gold on the analogue face. It only had twelve hours, but the strap was black leather and went neatly around Rodney's wrist when John tried it out. John made a pleased noise and strapped it on. It was heavy, and probably very expensive.

"This is a terrible accessory for someone with a receding hairline," Rodney told John. "I'll have to get a red car and a blonde to go with it."

"It's self-winding," John said, tapping the face. "The way you flail about, it'll never run down."

"I don't need the books," Rodney said, and looked at John from the corners of his eyes. "I suppose you want the graphic novels back."

"That'd be nice," John said, crossing his arms. "Did you even bother to ask before you took them?"

Rodney was tempted to apologise all over again, but he didn't think that would go down well at all. Instead, he raised his awkwardly heavy arm and said an ungracious thank you for the ridiculous, expensive present.

"Don't think this makes me your boytoy," he added, with a glare in John's direction as if he suspected ulterior motives.

John burst out in rude, insulting laughter. Rodney felt the warm glow of indignation and ire spread through him like pleasure.

"In your dreams, McKay," John said, canting his hips in some kind of utterly unnecessary macho pose.

Rodney spluttered and sniped back and said goodnight before John could force him to take the car. When he shut the door behind him, he had to take a deep breath before he could convince himself that John was still there, on the other side, and hadn't winked out like a hallucination.

Over the next few weeks, the feeling that John was impermanent never went away, so when Rodney came home late one night to find John waiting for him, with Ronon's gun strapped to his leg and a list of gate addresses from Teyla and a stuffed rucksack with a sleeping bag strapped to the top, he wasn't surprised. Relieved, perhaps, and heart-broken, but not surprised when John stood and asked, awkwardly, if Rodney would do him the favour of dialling the 'gate for him.

"Stay," Rodney said; he had to say it. "Please don't -- just, stay."

John's face crumpled and looked old in the dim light. "I'll come back."

Rodney shook his head, slowly. "No. You won't."

John's chin came up. "Then you come find me."

"Are you going to stun me if I say no?"

John tapped his finger on the gun. "I just. You'd be safe from Carter's wrath, Teyla or Ronon not so much. And I thought -- Jesus. Even with all the vacant rooms I've got upstairs, you still know me best of anyone. I just wanted it to be you."

"Whatever," Rodney said, and took a deep breath, and then another, and then he was walking along the taped yellow line down the hall, with John on his heels, trying not to make noise. The gate room was deserted. Rodney wondered if everyone but him had been in on the escape plan. He would have asked, but John pulled him into a hug and thanked him in a voice that broke, even though Rodney pretended that he hadn't heard and John, pulling back a moment later and looking down at the gate, pretended he hadn't spoken.

"You take care now," John said, clearing his throat beforehand, and Rodney couldn't say anything. He waved at the gate with his left hand, impatiently. The blue light from the gate shone on the watch face, and he had to drag his eyes up and away to look down at John.

"John," he said. John stopped just on the edge and turned around. He smiled, and waved. "Come home," Rodney said, and he could have sworn that John bit down on his lip at that. At any rate he nodded, once, before he stepped through and was gone.

  
_Gate, Gate, Paragate, Parasamgate, Bodhi Svaha_   


**Author's Note:**

> **Soundtrack**
> 
> God's Gonna Cut You Down (Johnny Cash - folk song cover)  
> Saigo no Megami (The Last Goddess) (Miyuki Nakajima): translation below  
> Let's Talk About Spaceships (Say Hi to Your Mom)  
> Nothing Else Matters (Apocalyptica - Metallica cover)  
> Broken Promises (Rusty Truck feat. Lenny Kravitz)  
> Wherever I May Roam (Apocalyptica - Metallica cover)
> 
> **soundtrack extras**  
>  Nothing Else Matters (Metallica)  
> No Regrets (Robbie Williams)
> 
> * * *
> 
> **The Last Goddess (Miyuki Nakajima)**
> 
> Why is it people only remember  
> The last dream they had?  
> Won't you try and remember a dream you saw as a child?
> 
> Ah, that was a broken toy  
> I loved it so much all, all the time, but  
> I couldn't fix it  
> I still cry for it in my dreams  
> They won't form words, the waves forming S-O-S  
> Is there anyone out there to receive them?  
> Ah, that was the last goddess  
> You're the real thing I'm waiting for  
> Ah, for example, even if the last rocket  
> Left you behind as it threw the earth away
> 
> Believe in the continent you haven't seen yet  
> Like the way a bird crosses the ocean  
> The paper with the promise written on it is in the wind  
> Is there anyone out there to receive it?  
> Ah, that was the last goddess  
> Even if the angels stop singing  
> Ah, that was the last goddess  
> You're the real thing I'm waiting for
> 
> Hearts change -- everyone changes  
> Go on and change, go on and change, become more loving  
> Why is it people only remember  
> The last dream they had?  
> Won't you try and remember a dream you saw as a child?
> 
> Ah, that was the last goddess  
> Even if the angels stop singing


End file.
